Monday, August 25, 2014

When it comes to attacking climate scientists, the alarmist Left has the market cornered

Paul Driessen

Left-leaning environmentalists, media and academics have long railed against the alleged conservative “war on science.” They augment this vitriol with substantial money, books, documentaries and conference sessions devoted to “protecting” global warming alarmists from supposed “harassment” by climate chaos skeptics, whom they accuse of wanting to conduct “fishing expeditions” of alarmist emails and “rifle” their file cabinets in search of juicy material (which might expose collusion or manipulated science).

A primary target of this “unjustified harassment” has been Penn State University professor Dr. Michael Mann, creator of the infamous “hockey stick” temperature graph that purported to show a sudden spike in average planetary temperatures in recent decades, following centuries of supposedly stable climate. But at a recent AGU meeting a number of other “persecuted” scientists were trotted out to tell their story of how they have been “attacked” or had their research, policy demands or integrity questioned.

To fight back against this “harassment,” the American Geophysical Union actually created a “Climate Science Legal Defense Fund,” to pay mounting legal bills that these scientists have incurred. The AGU does not want any “prying eyes” to gain access to their emails or other information. These scientists and the AGU see themselves as “Freedom Fighters” in this “war on science.” It’s a bizarre war.

While proclaiming victimhood, they detest and vilify any experts who express doubts that we face an imminent climate Armageddon. They refuse to debate any such skeptics, or permit “nonbelievers” to participate in conferences where endless panels insist that every imaginable and imagined ecological problem is due to fossil fuels. They use hysteria and hyperbole to advance claims that slashing fossil fuel use and carbon dioxide emissions will enable us to control Earth’s climate – and that references to computer model predictions and “extreme weather events” justify skyrocketing energy costs, millions of lost jobs, and severe damage to people’s livelihoods, living standards, health and welfare.

Reality is vastly different from what these alarmist, environmentalist, academic, media and political elites attempt to convey.

In 2009, before Mann’s problems began, Greenpeace started attacking scientists it calls “climate deniers,” focusing its venom on seven scientists at four institutions, including the University of Virginia and University of Delaware. This anti-humanity group claimed its effort would “bring greater transparency to the climate science discussion” through “educational and other charitable public interest activities.” (If you believe that, send your bank account number to those Nigerians with millions in unclaimed cash.)

UVA administrators quickly agreed to turn over all archived records belonging to Dr. Patrick Michaels, a prominent climate chaos skeptic who had recently retired from the university. They did not seem to mind that no press coverage ensued, and certainly none that was critical of these Spanish Inquisition tactics.

However, when the American Tradition Institute later filed a similar FOIA request for Dr. Mann’s records, UVA marshaled the troops and launched a media circus, saying conservatives were harassing a leading climate scientist. The AGU, American Meteorological Society and American Association of University Professors (the nation’s college faculty union) rushed forward to lend their support. All the while, in a remarkable display of hypocrisy and double standards, UVA and these organizations continued to insist it was proper and ethical to turn all of Dr. Michaels’ material over to Greenpeace.

Meanwhile, although it had started out similarly, the scenario played out quite differently at the University of Delaware. Greenpeace targeted Dr. David Legates, demanding access to records related to his role as the Delaware State Climatologist. The University not only agreed to this. It went further, and demanded that Legates produce all his records – regardless of whether they pertained to his role as State Climatologist, his position on the university faculty, or his outside speaking and writing activities, even though he had received no state money for any of this work. Everything was fair game.

But when the Competitive Enterprise Institute filed a FOIA request for documents belonging to several U of Delaware faculty members who had contributed to the IPCC, the university told CEI the state’s FOIA Law did not apply. (The hypocrisy and double standards disease is contagious.) Although one faculty contributor clearly had received state money for his climate change work, University Vice-President and General Counsel Lawrence White claimed none of the individuals had received state funds.

When Legates approached White to inquire about the disparate treatment, White said Legates did not understand the law. State law did not require that White produce anything, White insisted, but also did not preclude him from doing so. Under threat of termination for failure to respond to the demands of a senior university official, Legates was required to allow White to inspect his emails and hardcopy files.

Legates subsequently sought outside legal advice. At this, his academic dean told him he had now gone too far. “This puts you at odds with the University,” she told him, “and the College will no longer support anything you do.” This remarkable threat was promptly implemented. Legates was terminated as the State Climatologist, removed from a state weather network he had been instrumental in organizing and operating, and banished from serving on any faculty committees.

Legates appealed to the AAUP – the same union that had staunchly supported Mann at UVA. Although the local AAUP president had written extensively on the need to protect academic freedom, she told Legates that FOIA issues and actions taken by the University of Delaware’s vice-president and dean “would not fall within the scope of the AAUP.”

What about the precedent of the AAUP and other professional organizations supporting Dr. Mann so quickly and vigorously? Where was the legal defense fund to pay Legates’ legal bills? Fuggedaboutit.

In the end, it was shown that nothing White examined in Legates’ files originated from state funds. The State Climate Office had received no money while Legates was there, and the university funded none of Legates’ climate change research though state funds. This is important because, unlike in Virginia, Delaware’s FOIA law says that regarding university faculty, only state-funded work is subject to FOIA.

That means White used his position to bully and attack Legates for his scientific views – pure and simple. Moreover, a 1991 federal arbitration case had ruled that the University of Delaware had violated another faculty member’s academic freedom when it examined the content of her research. But now, more than twenty years later, U Del was at it again.

Obviously, academic freedom means nothing when one’s views differ from the liberal faculty majority – or when they contrast with views and “science” that garners the university millions of dollars a year from government, foundation, corporate and other sources, to advance the alarmist climate change agenda. All these institutions are intolerant of research by scientists like Legates, because they fear losing grant money if they permit contrarian views, discussions, debates or anything that questions the climate chaos “consensus.” At this point, academic freedom and free speech obviously apply only to advance selected political agendas, and campus “diversity” exists in everything but opinions.

Climate alarmists have been implicated in the ClimateGate scandal, for conspiring to prevent their adversaries from receiving grants, publishing scientific papers, and advancing their careers. Yet they are staunchly supported by their universities, professional organizations, union – and groups like Greenpeace.

Meanwhile, climate disaster skeptics are vilified and harassed by these same groups, who pretend they are fighting to “let scientists conduct research without the threat of politically motivated attacks.” Far worse, we taxpayers are paying the tab for the junk science – and then getting stuck with regulations, soaring energy bills, lost jobs and reduced living standards … based on that bogus science.

Right now, the climate alarmists appear to be winning their war on honest science. But storm clouds are gathering, and a powerful counteroffensive is heading their way.

Paul Driessen is senior policy analyst for the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (www.CFACT.org) and author of Eco-Imperialism: Green power - Black death.

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Dennis T. Averyhas been quoted in publications ranging from Time and The Washington Post to The Farm Journal. His article, “What's Wrong with Global Warming?” was published in the August 1999 issue of Reader's Digest. With S. Fred Singer, Avery is the coauthor of Unstoppable Global Warming; Every 1500 Years. He travels the world as a speaker, has testified before Congress, and has appeared on most of the nation's major television networks, including a program discussing the bacterial dangers of organic foods on ABC's 20/20. Avery studied agricultural economics at Michigan State University and the University of Wisconsin. He holds awards for outstanding performance from three different government agencies and was awarded the National Intelligence Medal of Achievement in 1983. In addition to lending his expertise to CARE as a member of the Energy Counsel, Dennis Avery currently serves as Director, Center for Global Food Issues and is a Senior Fellow for the Hudson Institute is a non-partisan policy research organization dedicated to innovative research and analysis that promotes global security, prosperity, and freedom.

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Robert L. Bradley, Jr. is one of the nation’s leading experts on the history and regulation of energy and related sustainable development issues. He has presented professional testimony on energy issues to the California Energy Commission and United States Senate; his opinion-page editorials on energy policy have appeared in the New York Times and many other newspapers across the country; his energy views have been aired on National Public Radio, Voice of America, CBS Radio Network, and Armed Forces Radio, as well as local programs. Bradley is a multi-published author whose most widely read book is Energy: the Master Resource (with Richard Fulmer). His newest is Capitalism at Work: Business, Government and Energy. He holds a B.A. in economics, a masters in economics from the University of Houston, and a Ph.D. in political economy from International College. Bradley is a member of the International Association for Energy Economics, the American Economics Association, and the American Historical Association. He is CEO and founder of the Institute for Energy Research in Houston; visiting fellow of the Institute of Economic Affairs in London; an adjunct scholar of the Cato Institute; and a member of the academic review committee of the Institute for Humane Studies at George Mason University.

Paul Driessen’scareer has included staff tenures with the United States Senate, Department of the Interior and an energy trade association. He has spoken and written frequently on energy and environmental policy, global climate change, corporate social responsibility, and on marine life associated with oil platforms off the coasts of California and Louisiana. Driessen received his BA in geology and field ecology from Lawrence University, JD from the University of Denver College of Law, and accreditation in public relations from the Public Relations Society of America. A former member of the Sierra Club and Zero Population Growth, he abandoned their cause when he recognized that the environmental movement had become intolerant in its views, inflexible in its demands, unwilling to recognize our tremendous strides in protecting the environment, and insensitive to the needs of billions of people who lack the food, electricity, safe water, healthcare and other basic necessities that we take for granted. Driessen is a senior fellow with the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow and Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise, nonprofit public policy institutes that focus on energy, the environment, economic development and international affairs.

Michael J. Economidesis among America's leading energy analysts who regularly appears on national TV and radio programs. As a consultant, educator, and PhD petroleum engineer, Economides has done technical and managerial work in more than 70 countries. A professor at the Cullen College of Engineering, University of Houston, Economides has written or co-written about 200 articles and peer-reviewed papers and 11 textbooks. Economides is the Editor-in-Chief for the Energy Tribunemagazine. He is also the co-author, with Ron Oligney, of the industry primer, The Color of Oil: The History, the Money and the Politics of the World's Biggest Business, which was published in 2000 and has since been translated into five languages. CARE is honored to include Michael Economides as a member of the Energy Counsel.

Michael R. Fox, Ph.D., is a retired nuclear scientist and university chemistry professor. He is the science and energy writer/reporter for the HawaiiReport.com. A resident of Kaneohe, Hawaii, he has nearly 40 years experience in the energy field. His interests and activities in the communications of science, energy, and the environment has led to several communications awards, hundreds of speeches, and many appearances on television and talk shows. Dr. Fox is listed by the Heartland Institute as a global warming/climate change expert. He is also the Senior Fellow for Science at the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii. He can be reached via email at mfox@grassrootinstitute.org. Please visit Dr. Mike Fox's blog at http://www.foxreport.org/.

Byron King is the resident energy and natural resource expert at Agora Financial, LLC. A geologist by training, he worked for the former Gulf Oil Company and has followed oil industry developments for over 30 years. Byron’s career path also took him into the U.S. Navy, both active duty and reserve. In the 1990s and 2000s Byron engaged in a vigorous private law practice. For the past five years Byron has been writing about energy and natural resource issues for an international audience. Currently, Byron writes and edits two major publications, Outstanding Investments and Energy and Scarcity Investor. Byron holds degrees from Harvard, the U.S. Naval War College and the University of Pittsburgh.

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